


I’ll Love You Well

by ThrillingDetectiveTales



Category: The Pacific (TV)
Genre: Discussion of crossdressing, Gender Roles, Genderplay, M/M, marriage kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-28
Updated: 2019-10-28
Packaged: 2021-01-05 23:07:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21216542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThrillingDetectiveTales/pseuds/ThrillingDetectiveTales
Summary: “It’s alright, you know,” Snafu murmured after a few silent seconds, trailing one hand up the length of Eugene’s back so he could stroke through his hair. Eugene made a muffled noise of inquisition into the collar of Snafu’s shirt and Snafu clarified, “That you like it.”“Like what?” Eugene managed, clumsily pretending at ignorance.Snafu clearly wasn’t interested in indulging the charade because he provided with pointed immediacy, “When I call you my wife.”





	I’ll Love You Well

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the following prompt off the [Loose Lips Sink Ships Prompt Meme:](https://looselipssinkships.altervista.org/)
> 
> "THE PACIFIC, Eugene B. Sledge/Merriell 'Snafu' Shelton, Snafu likes to call Sledge his good little southern belle or his prim and proper little housewife as a joke. Sledge is embarrassingly turned on by it."
> 
> As you might guess, this fic deals heavily with period-appropriate attitudes toward gender roles and also a good deal of genderplay. If that isn’t your thing, kindly run along.
> 
> Only kind of half beta-read, so any mistakes are mine. Also the French is from a translator so it’s probably wrong, apologies in advance.
> 
> Thank you Muccamukk for your continued encouragement and cheerleading~
> 
> Enjoy y’all!
> 
> **ETA:** Title is from [Kimbra’s _’Settle Down.’_](https://youtu.be/yHV04eSGzAA)

“Genie? Where you at?”

The call came from the front of the house, right on the tail-end of the familiar, rasping groan of the door. The damn thing had been moaning its way open since Eugene first showed up on the stoop of the battered little duplex nearly six months ago and he didn’t foresee that changing anytime soon, despite Snafu’s oft-professed intentions to oil the hinges.

“Back here!” Eugene hollered in reply, wiping at his sweat-pearled brow with the back of a gloved hand. He glanced up a moment later, when the soft tattoo of approaching footfalls crescendoed into an off-pitch creak, and blinked at Snafu where he was leaning against the jamb, kitchen door propped open at his back.

He had shucked his overalls so they hung loose around his waist, the sleeves of his white cotton work shirt rolled up to his elbows and a few more buttons undone down the front than was quite proper, not that Eugene minded the view. (He had gone on at effusive length about how very fetching he found that bared arrow of olive skin one night earlier in the summer, the two of them halfway to pickled on bottom shelf booze and stumbling their way home through the early morning dark.)

Snafu was streaked here and there with dirt or soot or God only knew what else, and there was plaster dust turning the hair just above his temple white in a ghostly puff. He had taken off his boots, at least, which meant that some part of Eugene’s most recent dressing down on the difficulties of scrubbing cement powder out of carpet fibers had penetrated his thick skull.

“Whatchu got your hand in down there, cher?” Snafu asked, peering curiously to where Eugene was kneeling in the spotty crabgrass flocking their narrow yard. He crossed one leg over the other and rocked his heel back and forth, bare toes tilted skyward.

“Zinnias,” Eugene replied. Snafu’s smirk sprawled open into a proper grin.

“Zinnias?” he echoed.

Eugene gave him a sharp nod and then turned his attention back to the massacre of clippings piled around him, confirming darkly, “Zinnias.” He picked up a handful of half-rotted leaves and tossed them back down with a huff. “I bought ‘em last week at Averill’s, you remember?”

“Sure,” Snafu agreed, slightly muffled. Eugene looked up just as he ducked his head to fish around in his pocket, searching for a lighter to put the cigarette he had tucked into the corner of his mouth to good use. “Went in ‘cause we needed a washer to fix up that leaky faucet in the bathroom and came out lookin’ like a parade float. You crowed pretty near the whole way home ‘bout what a good deal the old man cut you, if memory serves.”

Eugene snorted and sat back on his heels, shaking his head. “Yeah, well,” he sighed, “more fool me, I guess.” He nudged despondently at a drooping purple blossom while the lighter hissed to life up on the porch. 

Snafu had a protective hand cupped around the flame, long lashes fanning across his hollowed cheeks as he sucked at the filter. The simple sight was enough to send a thin wash of heat flooding through Eugene’s face.

“Damn things won’t take,” he continued, while Snafu straightened up and leaned his head against the doorframe, hot orange cherry glowing between his fingers. “I thought it was just the aphids, but Mama says it’s too wet down here for ‘em. And too hot. Or too cold, come winter.”

Snafu’s eyebrows leapt up at the mention of their neighbor. 

Mama Foucher harbored an unabashed fondness for Snafu but had spent the better part of three months eyeballing Eugene with blatant distrust every time she bumped into him, which happened fairly regularly considering that the other half of the duplex belonged to her. That had been around the same time she started demanding Snafu’s help with increasingly absurd household repairs—presumably as some sort of tacit punishment for carting this strange, sharp-edged white boy home with him from the war, though her tolerance for Eugene had evened keel somewhat in the preceding weeks.

“When did you talk to Mama?” Snafu asked, picking his way down the steps and exhaling a soft grey stream into the sticky air of the early evening.

“We were hanging laundry this morning at the same time and she needed a little help with her line,” Eugene shrugged. “She asked me how the garden was coming along and then laughed in my face when I told her I put zinnias in.”

Snafu came and crouched next to him, poised on the balls of his feet with one arm slung casually across Eugene’s shoulders. He sighed through his nose, twin jets of smoke, and tapped the ash of his cigarette out into the grass at his side. He smelled of sweat and wood and Lucky Strikes—a favorite, familiar perfume that never failed to make Eugene’s mouth run dry.

“Looks alright to me,” Snafu offered, curling his fingers into a loose fist against Eugene’s collarbone and dragging his thumb absently across the sweat-damp linen of his shirt. “Better’n it did before, anyhow.”

Eugene cleared his throat and muttered, “That ain’t saying much.” He leaned into Snafu’s side when the other man tugged him over, resting his temple against Snafu’s cheek.

“Pauvre bête” Snafu crooned, turning his face to press a quick kiss against Eugene’s hair. “All twisted up over a buncha little flowers.” 

“You’re an ass,” Eugene grinned, swatting lazily at Snafu’s chest.

“Tu m’aimes,” Snafu asserted pleasantly. He gave Eugene a gentle shake and then pulled his arm away, trailing his knuckles across the back of Eugene’s neck as he went. “Let’s get you cleaned up, cher. Throw some dinner on, hm? Bet you’ll feel better after you eat something.”

“I already got a roast in,” Eugene grumbled, but he rose to his feet at Snafu’s urging, stripping his gloves off and shaking them out against his thigh. He left them hanging over the peeling porch rail and hovered for a second at Snafu’s shoulder where he was lingering in the doorway, finishing off his cigarette.

When it was nearly burnt down to the filter he smirked and offered it to Eugene, who rolled his eyes but curled his fingers over Snafu’s and ducked his head to help himself to a drag. His mouth brushed Snafu’s thumb and Snafu sucked a short, sharp breath past his teeth. Eugene smirked around the cigarette and stood with a long, thick sigh, savoring the familiar dirty tang of tobacco and the hot slide of smoke over his tongue.

Snafu blinked at him, slow, and tucked his bottom lip up under his teeth. He shook his head with a soft laugh and pinched the cherry off into a rusted paint can sitting just to the side of the door, dropping the butt in after. There was a muted fizz as the whole mess hit the inch or two of run-off rainwater stagnating at the bottom and drowned in a soggy soup of its cast off brethren. Snafu turned and shuffled his way inside and Eugene followed, the two of them spilling into the cramped little kitchen with their elbows knocking and shoulders brushing.

“Smells good,” Snafu observed, while Eugene kicked the door shut behind them.

“You didn’t notice when you walked through before?” Eugene teased, making for the sink to scrub the evidence of his gardening foibles off his hands. Snafu rolled his eyes, mouth quirking, and caught him by the waist as he passed.

“Had other things on my mind,” he said, swinging Eugene around and herding him back against the counter.

“Yeah?” Eugene grinned. Snafu’s breath rolled in a warm wave against his cheek as he hummed his confirmation, and Eugene reached out to hook his fingers over the folded waistline of his overalls. “What kinda things?”

“You,” Snafu said, and sealed their mouths together, warm and chaste and sweet. He pulled back just enough to breathe, nudging Eugene’s nose with his own. “This.” He kissed Eugene again, longer and wetter, and curled his palms over Eugene’s hips. “Fellas wouldn’t believe me if I told ‘em,” he murmured, low and absent against the blade of Eugene’s jaw.

“Told ‘em what?” Eugene breathed, tilting his head back encouragingly as Snafu trailed a line of meandering kisses down his throat. Snafu hummed again, tightening his grip on Eugene’s waist as he sucked a hot, stinging spot into the tender skin at the juncture of Eugene’s shoulder.

Eugene made a choked noise of pleasure in the back of his throat and closed his eyes as Snafu rumbled, “‘Bout you. Pretty little Alabama poppy I got tucked up in my house, fussing with the garden and doing up the washing and making sure dinner’s ready for me when I get home.”

“Snaf,” Eugene warned, tugging at the fabric bunched around Snafu’s waist. His face was hot, stomach twisting at the words even as they sent a frisson of lust zinging through his belly. 

“What?” Snafu straightened up with a sly grin, pale eyes sparking with amusement. “It’s the truth, ain’t it? They’d be panting after the likes of you, if they knew. Every last one of ‘em. Bonafide Southern belle with them big, dark eyes and skin all pale like one a’ them dolls?” He loosed a low, admiring whistle and Eugene frowned. “Not a man in the bunch whose wife could compare to you, cher.”

Eugene’s stomach lurched, a wave of heat creeping up his throat.

“I ain’t your wife,” he corrected with a sharp glare.

Snafu snorted. “Bullshit.”

“I _ ain’t,” _ Eugene protested. There was a better argument to be made here, he was certain, but it wouldn’t come to him beyond the bleating wail of warning that had started blaring through his mind.

This was far from the first time Snafu had made a joke along matrimonial lines, but he was usually possessed of better sense than to broach the subject while Eugene shuddered under the flat of his tongue. The assertion felt more real here, somehow, and the weight of it pressed hard against a tender place in Eugene’s chest that he didn’t care to look at too closely. He pushed at Snafu, trying to make some space between them, but it didn’t do much good—Eugene was broader, sure, and maybe stronger, too, in a fair contest, but Snafu was an old hand when it came to digging his heels in.

“Good as,” he argued, stuck to Eugene like a burr. He wagged his eyebrows and added conspiratorially, “Prettier’n all the other dames fool enough to wait around on the layabouts I work with, that’s for damn sure.”

_ “Snaf,” _Eugene said again, but this time it came out cracked in the middle, small and pleading.

Snafu’s face softened, though the amusement didn’t fade much. He nosed at Eugene’s cheek, sighing long and deep, and wrapped his arms around Eugene’s stiff frame. Eugene stood rigid for a frozen beat, stomach churning and skin prickling while his eyes went hot at the corners. He blinked twice, took a shaky breath, and then relaxed into Snafu’s embrace, tucking his flaming face into the curve of Snafu’s throat. Snafu made a quiet, affectionate sound and pulled him in close, swaying absently back and forth.

Eugene spared a moment to worry what they might look like to any neighbor who ventured a glance, standing around in their quaint little kitchen all tangled together like kudzu, but the steady, easy rhythm of Snafu’s breath puffing against his ear settled his anxieties almost as soon as they burbled to existence. Besides, only Mama Foucher had a direct line of sight from this angle, and the walls were thin enough that the truth of their relationship probably hadn’t escaped her understanding for very long.

“It’s alright, you know,” Snafu murmured after a few silent seconds, trailing one hand up the length of Eugene’s back so he could stroke through his hair. Eugene made a muffled noise of inquisition into the collar of Snafu’s shirt and Snafu clarified, “That you like it.”

“Like what?” Eugene managed, clumsily pretending at ignorance.

Snafu clearly wasn’t interested in indulging the charade because he provided with pointed immediacy, “When I call you my wife.”

Eugene stiffened again, preparing to pull away. They had never talked about it before, Eugene’s funny little quirk. Not like this, anyway—open and unapologetic. It was just as mortifyingly painful as Eugene had imagined it would be on the rare occasions he let himself consider it, and for a heart-shattering second he hated Snafu for dragging it out into the light.

Snafu must have felt him gearing up to flee because he got a haphazard fistful of Eugene’s auburn hair and tugged at it in just the way Eugene liked best, with enough force to melt him into a complacent puddle. Eugene sucked a jagged breath, scalp tingling pleasantly, and settled back into the proprietary curve of Snafu’s arms. He licked his dry lips, mouth so close to Snafu’s throat that he managed to catch a skimming taste of Snafu’s salt-streaked skin, and Snafu shivered.

“Don’t get all worked up, now,” he chided fondly, releasing his grip to pet at Eugene’s temple, trace the shell of his ear. “I like it, too. Pretty little thing like you settled down with a bit of rough like me?” He huffed a laugh into Eugene’s hair. “What’s not to like about that?”

“I don’t - ” Eugene started, but the words shriveled to ash on his tongue. He swallowed around the thick, painful knot bobbing at the back of his throat. His eyes were sore and itchy, pressure building behind them like he was suffering a sudden bout of hay fever. “I just - ” His voice failed him again and Eugene shook his head, tightening his fists in the worn cotton of Snafu’s shirt.

“Ne t’inquiète pas,” Snafu soothed, rubbing Eugene’s back. “It’s alright, Genie. You’re alright. Ain’t nothing wrong with it, cher. Nothing at all. Matter of fact,” he straightened up, reclaiming one arm to dig around in his pocket and leaving the other slung loosely around Eugene’s waist.

Eugene sniffed and cleared his throat, settling back just enough that he could see Snafu’s face, the shallow divot of concentration warping the line of his brow and the pink sliver of tongue poking out the corner of his mouth.

After a moment of searching, patting one pocket and then another, he turned up a small, rectangular cardboard box and breathed a triumphant, “Aha!” It was dusty blue, a few shades darker than denim, with thin lines of gold scrollwork cutting a frame into the flat surface. “There we go.” Snafu brandished it like he was presenting a medal and announced, “I got you something.”

“What is it?” Eugene asked, fixing the box with a suspicious eye. Snafu smirked at him.

“A gift,” he explained unhelpfully. Eugene frowned, confused, and Snafu lifted one shoulder in a lazy shrug. “S’what good men do, ain’t it? Surprise their wives with little trinkets?”

Eugene’s face flared again, stomach twisting, and he cut his gaze to the floor. The scuffed-up linoleum swam in the stinging line of his vision. He swallowed once, twice, and shook his head again, croaking, “This ain’t funny, Snaf.”

“Who’s laughing?” Snafu countered amiably. He shuffled back in close, his arm still a warm band of heat looped low and casual around Eugene’s hips. “C’mon, Genie,” he goaded, tilting the box back and forth. It made a soft, unfamiliar scraping noise. “Gotta open the damn thing ‘fore you decide you don’t want it.”

Eugene sighed and held out an unenthused hand. “If I open it, will you shut up and let me get back to cooking?”

“Only if you don’t like it,” Snafu assured around a grin. “But,” he added in a low, confident rasp, placing the box carefully in Eugene’s open palm, “I think you will.”

It was lighter than Eugene expected, so light he was half-convinced it might float if he dropped it. He could just ignore it, he knew. Toss the box in the trash and refuse to engage in whatever stupid little game Snafu was playing. It wouldn’t be the first time a romantic overture from one to the other of them went off spectacularly badly.

Eugene felt like an idiot, standing here red-faced and half-hard with his feelings all tangled into an indecipherable knot in his gut while Snafu watched him squirm. Still, he couldn’t summon quite enough resentment for their current conversational trajectory to willfully overlook the affectionate heat of Snafu’s good humor or the excited sheen in his big, luminous eyes.

“If I don’t like it,” Eugene reiterated slowly, “you’ll let it alone?”

Snafu nodded, gaze clear and intent.

“All of it?” Eugene pressed. “Even the - ” His voice failed him before he could figure out how to verbalize the fact that it made him humiliatingly stiff in his shorts when Snafu sweet-talked him like Eugene was his fresh-faced young bride, but it must have come across in the silence because Snafu nodded again.

“Hand to God,” he promised.

“Fine,” Eugene muttered. He rolled his shoulders and licked his lips, staring down at the box with grim determination. It was probably best, he considered, to just flip the damn thing open and get it over with. Snafu would have a good laugh at Eugene’s expense and whatever bit of silliness he’d wrapped up would find its way into the garbage and Eugene would be left alone for a few blessed minutes to stew in his embarrassment and oversee the structural integrity of the pot roast. He was distantly aware of a fine tremor underneath his skin, quivering all the way out to the tips of his fingers.

“It don’t bite,” Snafu offered, dragging his wide palm in a soothing line from the small of Eugene’s back up to his shoulders. Eugene chipped a glare over at him and Snafu closed his mouth obligingly, lips twisting into a fond knot that pulled a dimple into the plane of his cheek.

Eugene took another breath and lifted the lid off the box, as wary as if he were handling a live round. He frowned down at the contents as they appeared and blinked once, then again, some faulty circuit in his brain failing to deliver an understanding of what, precisely, he was looking at.

“Well?” Snafu asked gently, after Eugene had spent a good ten seconds scowling down at the demure, off-white strands shining gauzily against the box’s dark surface. His voice was soft and hesitant, almost shy, which was enough of a rarity to pull Eugene’s attention away from the gift he couldn’t quite fathom just yet.

“Pearls?” he asked, weak and hoarse. Snafu met his wondering gaze with a sheepish little shrug.

“They ain’t real,” he explained. “Can’t afford real on a workman’s salary.” It rang like an apology in the air between them, which had grown very close and very warm. “But I figured they might tide you over ‘til I can rustle up something better.”

“Where - ” Eugene started, and licked his lips when his voice caught, ragged in his dry throat. He swallowed, took a shaky breath, and tried again. “Where’d you even get them?”

“Couple of the fellas had a mind to pick up lunch in town today, get away for a spell. I saw ‘em in a little shop window we passed ‘cross the way from the deli and couldn’t stop thinking ‘bout what you’d look like wearing ‘em.” Snafu huffed a laugh and admitted, “The guys gave me hell for it, too. Thought I must’ve been in the doghouse, or something, but I told ‘em I ain’t gotta be in bad graces just to wanna fix the missus up nice.”

The simple statement struck that tender spot in Eugene’s chest like a match-head against striking paper and the wretched, itching heat behind his eyes flared white-hot and spilled over. He sucked a tiny sob through his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut, pinched at the corners with the fingers of his free hand. 

Snafu tensed next to him, curling a concerned hand around Eugene’s elbow and murmuring, alarmed, “Genie?”

“Sorry,” Eugene breathed. He shook his head and pressed his fingers in hard enough to send sprays of color bursting off into the dark corners of his vision. “Sorry, I’m - ” He took a slow, shaky breath in and exhaled on a laugh, “Fuck.”

Snafu stood there patiently while Eugene collected himself, running his thumb in absent, soothing strokes along the inside of Eugene’s arm and humming something tuneless and off-key in the back of his throat. When Eugene finally blinked his eyes open again, Snafu had shuffled around in front of him and was watching him with a tight, hopeful expression that made Eugene’s stomach dip.

“Alright, cher?” he asked gently, and Eugene nodded. Snafu mirrored the motion and then tilted his chin toward the box, still clutched in Eugene’s hand, though it was one wrong move away from spilling its contents all over the linoleum. He gave Eugene’s elbow a squeeze and ran his hand up to Eugene’s wrist, pressing the pad of his thumb over the pulse fluttering therein. “What d’you say? Wanna try ‘em on?”

Eugene didn’t trust himself to reply without causing another spectacle so he bit his lip and nodded instead. He couldn’t quite meet Snafu’s eye, but the other man didn’t seem to mind, plucking the box from Eugene’s stiff fingers and fishing the necklace out to dangle in the air.

It really was lovely, even if it was fake—a single strand of classic, cream beads with a pearlized finish and a simple silver clasp at the back. It reminded him vaguely of his mother’s favorite necklace, though where hers featured a dainty knot of chain between each pearl, these all slid loose on their cording, knocking against one another in a sharp-edged susurrus that made Eugene’s skin tingle with anticipation.

Snafu looped the necklace around his wrist and tucked the empty box back into his pocket, stepping up into Eugene’s space and reaching for the topmost button done up on his shirt.

“I would, you know,” Snafu said quietly, and made quick work of unfastening Eugene’s shirtfront down just past his sternum. He pushed the collar open, sliding his palm along the curve of Eugene’s shoulder and dropping his thumb tenderly over the hollow of Eugene’s throat. Eugene’s cock twitched in his pants, pulse drumming hard. “Take you right on down to the courthouse tomorrow, if they’d have us.”

“Snaf,” Eugene sighed, grasping clumsily at the shallow gulf between them until he got a fistful of Snafu’s work shirt, down low near his hip.

“I oughta do you better,” Snafu murmured, leaning in to brush his nose against Eugene’s cheek. “Put on a whole to-do, with a band and a cake and more booze than we saw on VJ-Day. Get you all dolled up in something lacy and white.” 

He sighed, low and wistful, and curled a palm around the back of Eugene’s neck when Eugene shivered. His mouth was warm and wet and so close all Eugene would have to do taste it was tilt his face up.

Snafu unspooled the necklace from around his wrist and the quiet _shink-shink_ of the beads slipping against one another tugged a hot ribbon of want through Eugene’s belly, so sweet that he closed his eyes against the pull of it.

The heat of Snafu’s hand retreated from Eugene’s skin and a spare second later his wrist brushed the hinge of Eugene’s jaw. The necklace settled cool over Eugene’s collarbones, tickling his throat. The click of the clasp was loud in the quiet room, and Eugene’s breath hitched at the sound. 

“I’ll tell you what though, Genie,” Snafu rumbled, tracing the line of the necklace over Eugene’s shoulder so the beads shifted and rolled against his fevered skin. “I don’t need no party or nobody’s permission to know you been Mrs. Shelton since you showed up at my door.”

Eugene wasn’t aware that he was moving until he had himself pressed up against the whole long, lean line of Snafu’s body. Their mouths slid together, wet and off-center, and Snafu smothered a laugh into the kiss. He stumbled back a step, circling one of his arms around Eugene’s hips and bringing the other up to curl possessively around the back of Eugene’s head. When he found his footing again he licked his way past Eugene’s teeth and Eugene whined, high in his throat.

“Thought about this all day,” Snafu murmured, biting at Eugene’s lip. Eugene gasped and rolled his hips, searching desperately for friction. Snafu nosed along the line of his jaw, sucking a kiss into the tender divot just under his ear.

Eugene shivered against him and moaned hoarsely, “Fuck.”

“That too,” Snafu agreed. He guided Eugene carefully back against the hard line of the counter, tugging his shirttails free as they went and stealing away every scrap of breath Eugene managed to catch with kiss after slow, searing kiss.

By the time his hips caught the edge of the counter, Eugene was so dizzy with want that he nearly collapsed into it, grateful for the added support in keeping his knees under him. He groped around and got a hand curled over the little lip at the edge while Snafu pulled back just enough to reach down between them.

Eugene gasped a few greedy mouthfuls of sticky air while Snafu fussed with the buckle of Eugene’s belt.

“Gotta get you in something better next time,” he muttered, tugging the belt loose and dropping it carelessly to the floor. “Something shorter, with a little swing to it.” He palmed at Eugene’s dick through the placket of his trousers and Eugene just managed to choke back a whimper. Snafu met his gaze, molding his fingers loosely to the shape of Eugene’s cock and giving an encouraging squeeze when Eugene pushed up into his grip. “One of those swishy little numbers with flowers all over it, maybe. All flowy like the girls like these days. Get my hands up your skirt as soon as I walk in the door.”

_ “Please.” _The word slipped wantonly through Eugene’s teeth before he could catch it. He was instantly flushed with a roaring wave of embarrassed heat, face burning and stomach lurching.

Snafu slid the palm of his free hand up to cup Eugene’s cheek, grinning and brushing his thumb along the line of Eugene’s lower lip.

“You like that?” he asked, eyes hooded and hopeful, mouth swollen and face flushed. He made such a picture that a bright bolt of want struck straight through all the shame dragging miserably under Eugene’s skin. He summoned the courage to nod and Snafu surged forward and groaned into his mouth. Between one breath and the next, he’d undone Eugene’s slacks and slipped his hand past Eugene’s shorts to get at his dick.

Eugene moaned around Snafu’s tongue, rocking up into his calloused grip and using the counter at his back for leverage. Snafu wasn’t a big man, by any means, but in this moment he loomed. Eugene felt blanketed completely by his presence, boxed in on all sides and safe in a way he had rarely felt outside of a well-dug foxhole with Snafu at his six. 

He could feel the necklace against his skin, swaying with every shift and shiver and sigh. There was a part of him that was still twisted into an anguished knot over how much he liked it, how badly he wanted it—the same part that looked back in horror to the time he’d been reprimanded as a boy for getting into his mother’s lipstick—but it had been pretty handily silenced for the moment by the weight of the beads around Eugene’s throat, the honest affection in Snafu’s voice when he talked about Eugene in the same way a fellow did his wife.

“Say it again,” he breathed, before he realized he was speaking.

Snafu hummed curiously against his jaw, working his thumb under the head of Eugene’s cock in a way that made him cry out.

“Say it again,” Eugene begged, head swimming. He felt fully capsized in the depths of his desire, grabbing desperately at Snafu’s shoulders, at his hair, pleading in a thin voice he almost didn’t recognize, “Say it. Please, tell me - call me - ”

“Call you what, cher?” Snafu asked, low and sly as he nosed along the line of Eugene’s throat. “Mrs. Shelton?” He pressed his tongue flat against the tendon there, catching the string of beads underneath it so they dug into Eugene’s skin, a hard, hot counterpoint to the slick cushion of Snafu’s tongue.

Eugene sobbed and rutted shamelessly into Snafu’s fist. “Yes,” he gasped, whole body pulling trip-wire tight when Snafu twisted his wrist. “Yes, please.”

“Mrs. Shelton,” Snafu sighed, his breath curling warm around Eugene’s ear. Eugene was tingling all the way out to his toes, his pleasure rising fast with every rough syllable, every practiced movement of Snafu’s hand. “Goddamn, but that sounds good, don’t it?” He scraped his teeth over the blade of Eugene’s jaw and rumbled, “Pretty little Mrs. Merriell Shelton.”

Eugene’s orgasm struck him so hard it nearly took him to the floor. He was spared the indignity only by the counter at his back and the pressure of Snafu’s thigh between his legs, pinning him in place. Snafu stroked him carefully through it, murmuring little snatches of slur-edged French into Eugene’s hair while he shuddered and gasped.

He was still shaking when he came back to himself, trembling in the curve of Snafu’s arm while he dropped a kiss to Eugene’s temple.

“ - vais faire de vous ma femme pour de vrai,” he was saying in a lazy rasp. “Je promets.”

“Thought we agreed it ain’t fair when you do that,” Eugene mumbled, leaning his cheek against Snafu’s and sinking forward into him.

“Didn’t figure you could hear me, cher,” Snafu replied, amused. “Seemed like you were pretty well distracted, there, for a minute.” Eugene snorted and turned his face into Snafu’s throat, pressing a kiss to the sweat-damp column and smiling at the pleased rumble that hummed between them.

“Gimme a second,” he sighed, nuzzling at Snafu’s jaw, “and I’ll get you.”

“Don’t put yourself out,” Snafu teased, and wrapped his arm a little tighter around Eugene’s waist. His other hand was still trapped between them, though he’d drawn it back out of Eugene’s shorts and splayed his palm flat and warm against the low plane of Eugene’s belly instead. Eugene would be a sticky mess when he stood up, but it was easy enough to ignore, for now, with Snafu breathing slow and steady around him.

“Shut up,” he replied, swatting Snafu absently on the shoulder. “You know I’m good for it.”

They stayed there for a long moment, twined drowsily together while the clock hanging on the far wall kept time, Snafu humming his way badly through some radio tune he’d gotten stuck in his head and Eugene fighting not to succumb to his usual inclination of falling asleep after messing around. It was difficult, warm and sated and content as he was, leaning against Snafu’s shoulder with his eyes closed. He had just about mustered the wherewithal to straighten up and set about returning the favor when Snafu stiffened in his arms and asked, “You smell that?”

Eugene blinked and lifted his head, frowning. There _was_ something slightly off about the kitchen, though he couldn’t quite say what at a glance. He tilted his chin up and risked a curious breath, nearly sneezing at the way it stung in his nose. It took his pleasure-lax brain a second to snap to attention, but when it finally did he shoved Snafu away, grousing, “Aw hell!” as he sprang toward the stove.

After a frenzied second of finagling, he’d managed to turn the oven off and yanked the door open, swearing under his breath when it belched a cloud of gauzy grey smoke out into the air. Snafu shuffled up beside him, putting a hand to Eugene’s lower back as he straightened up again.

“The goddamn pot roast burned,” he scowled, gesturing to the gently smoking Dutch oven resting on the upper grate. There were a few streams of crisp-edged runoff that had dripped over the sides crusted onto the white ceramic surface.

Snafu made a soft noise of acknowledgment and studied the scene for a moment. While he was lost in consideration, Eugene became suddenly aware that he had raised a hand to his throat and was running his knuckles over the necklace in absent, even strokes. He jerked it back down to his side just as Snafu came to some decision and clicked his tongue.

“Well, ma belle,” he sighed, scrubbing at his jaw, “we better get cleaned up.” He cut a small smirk over in Eugene’s direction and squeezed Eugene’s hip. “Looks like I’m takin’ the missus out for a night on the town.”

Eugene rolled his eyes and shook his head, folding his arms across his chest and trying his best to ignore the flutter in his belly. He swallowed and licked his lips, shifting his weight as he muttered awkwardly, “You can cut all that out, now, Snaf.”

Snafu’s eyebrows tilted up toward his hair, surprised. Eugene felt his face flush again and silently cursed his complexion. Christ, but he’d already spent the better part of the evening looking a lobster. It was lucky that Snafu found it as endearing a trait as he did Eugene’s bizarre affinity for certain marital affectations, or he’d have been tossed onto the streets of New Orleans months ago now.

“It was good of you,” Eugene continued, plodding miserably forward despite the uncomfortable tension coiling through his frame. “And I - I appreciate it, but you ain’t gotta keep it up. I know it’s - I know it ain’t - you can just stop, alright?”

“Mon doux couyon,” Snafu sighed, looking deeply unimpressed. “I wasn’t doing you a favor.” 

Eugene, armed with just enough knowledge of Snafu’s strange bastard French to know when he was being insulted, frowned at him. 

“This is as much for me as it is for you,” Snafu continued, reaching up to hook his fingers under the necklace and give it a pointed tug. “I ain’t gonna tell you again, comprenez vous?”

“Snaf - ” Eugene protested, but Snafu didn’t let him finish. He yanked at the necklace, hard, and Eugene leaned forward with a yelp. At another time he might have stood fast, let the thin cord snap against the back of his neck, but it seemed in this moment a greater tragedy than he could bear to see the little pearls, fake though they were, spill out across the floor.

“I meant what I said,” Snafu snarled against Eugene’s mouth, sealing the words with a brutal, claiming kiss. “You’re _mine,_ cher. My sweetheart, my best girl, my pretty little housewife to spoil. Don’t matter what God or the law or anybody else has to say about it.” He kissed Eugene again, softer this time, and so sweet it made Eugene’s toes curl inside his shoes. Snafu breathed out, slow, through his nose and tilted his head to break the kiss, leaning in so their foreheads brushed together. His gaze was fixed on Eugene’s mouth as he breathed hopefully, “Alright?”

Eugene nodded, so close that their noses bumped, and swallowed around the knot of emotion at the back of his throat. His eyes were stinging again, but he paid it no mind.

“Alright,” he agreed thickly, curling his fingers tenderly over Snafu’s wrist. “Alright.”

“Good,” Snafu said, carefully disentangling himself from the delicate beaded strand. He brushed a kiss to the corner of Eugene’s mouth and stepped back, nodding to the hallway with a subdued smirk. “G’won and get changed, then, cher. I take you out looking like that and you’re bound to ‘cause a riot.”

Eugene reached out and plucked at the fabric of Snafu’s work shirt, arching an eyebrow as he asked, “What about you?”

“I’ll be there in a minute,” Snafu assured, squeezing Eugene’s wrist. He waved a hand at the oven. “Oughta take care of this mess, first.”

“Leave it,” Eugene instructed. Snafu arched an eyebrow.

“What, and wait for you to bawl me out about it in the morning?”

Eugene huffed a laugh and bit his lip. “Thought you said you wanted a wife,” he said, suffused with an almost comical glow of pride when the sentiment only wobbled in his throat a little.

Snafu’s grin sprawled wide and dark and sweet.

“S’pose I did,” he agreed, following easily along when Eugene used the fabric of his shirt to tug him toward the hall. He brought his hands up to Eugene’s hips and guided him along in his backward shuffle. “Got myself a damn fine one, anyhow.”

“Yeah,” Eugene confirmed, the necklace a shifting, sibilant weight against his skin. “I guess you do.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
